Not sure how to help my sisters anxiety attacks.

[SuperInferior]

My sister suffers from anxiety attacks and she's told she has too much adrenaline which makes her anxious and she needs to exercise to help control it.
They also gave her beta blockers but she doesn't really take them because her anti-depressants say they shouldn't be used with beta blockers and the doctors casually dismiss the idea it's a potential problem so she doesn't really trust their indifference.

The problem I'm having is her panic attacks. She had one last night while I was in bed and I couldn't sleep properly because I felt so bad about not going out to her. I thinks he had it in the hallway and my mom was telling my brother to leave her alone as she'd come out of it.

Please note, my mother wasn't being cruel or neglecting her! It's just before she used to get protective of her and keep tlaking to her, telling her to use a paper bag and getting frustrated when she wouldn't (she prefers using her hands to breath through, which I've read does the same job as the paper bag). I told my mom that I thought her getting frustrated might be making it worse for my sister. And by what I've gathered she finds the whole event extremely embarrassing and never wants to talk about it. So I assume from this information, my mom decided almost ignoring it would prevent undue attention to her state and help her come out of it on her own.

I agree with my mom that normalising it might be better than panicking around her. But is ignoring her a problem? It doesn't sit right with me and I can't tell how she feels about it.
We make sure she isn't sitting on the stairs or anywhere dangerous as she has passed out and continued shaking before, but otherwise we kind of leave her to it. If it's during the day and I'm there I just put my arm around her and rub it a bit, which sometimes seems good for her, but other times she's over sensitive to touch and says when she's normal that it felt like she was being pushed about.


So my question is basically, is ignoring her ill-advised? I understand how to act would depend on the individual too, but I can't figure out as she doesn't like talking about it, and the amount of panic attacks are increasing.

[alankay]

Super, ignoring it won't help as far as I know but being there for her as calmly as you can be is best.
I take a beta blocker as well and an SSRI will be OK with it.
The best thing to do is to calmly/firmly tell her to look at you in the eyes and have her breath slowly and deeply and at the same time help her relax the muscles in her head, head, jaw and shoulders as these get tight and is part of the fear response. Anxiety has a hard time existing well in a relaxed body.
It'd fine to rub her back and talk to her calmly and tell her it(anxiety) will come in waves and will pass. Ask her to talk to you thereby distracting her(it may help). She may benefit from a shower/bath. Aviod loud nosies/news/violent movies when she's anxious.
You can perhaps best help her in the long run by talking about what in life is stressing/bothering her to help defuse the anxiety. PM me any time at all. Alankay.

[jessed03]

Super, ignoring it won't help as far as I know but being there for her as calmly as you can be is best.

This is the best way of being there for somebody really. Think about the way a baby just needs to know somebody is there, and needs to be comforted. Anxiety works on that same primordial instinct. Of course don't treat her like a baby :) but just to have somebody around that isn't judging, and that is calm can be reassuring. The best way is to not feed the panic at all. Panic is a hungry emotion, and feeds off of others. If she sees you become emotional, say angry, or tense, or worried, it will feed off it. The best help I got was for people around me just to be there, and remain calm, and understanding. Sometimes somebody reminding me what was happening (e.g. just an adrenaline release) was quite helpful. I remember during my worst attacks, I'd call up my Mum, who also had suffered before, and she'd just pick up the phone, even in the middle of the night, and just calmly talk to me 'It's ok, it's alright, we're all here for you..' then she'd talk gently about some random stuff. I found they always lasted about half as long when I did that.

The idea is just to help ground her. Keep her in reality, instead of drifting off into panic. Some find talking about random stuff can help, others find that focusing on distrction, or relaxation techniques helps. Alan gave some good examples.

I echo the guy's thoughts. Ignoring it will make her feel misunderstood and isolated. When somebody feels they can't express something, they fight against it. Everyone on here will tell you, when you fight against a panic attack, its like adding gas to a flame. Be calming when the attack is there, and more logical when it's calmed down.

Like Kev said, she can come on over to this forum, and have a good old vent! :)

You can give yourself some credit, most people just pass off this problem as attention seeking, you're making a big effort to understand it. Understanding is probably the most important aspect of this condition.